What Else Can I Do to Conserve?

In addition to using your Sprinkler Times online program or smartphone app, here are a few other tips to help you conserve water.

Turn off the FaucetWhen washing dishes, cutting vegetables, brushing our teeth, or waiting for the shower to warm up, we tend to let the faucet run, wasting gallons of water with each of these simple activities.

Quickly Repair Leaky FaucetsEven a small drip can turn into a huge waste of water if ignored for too long. Depending on their location, some leaks can go unnoticed for months. To prevent this, keep an eye out for any unexplained spikes in your water bill. A single leaky faucet can waste hundreds of gallons a year.

Don’t Let the Hose RunWhen washing your car, turn the hose off when you’re not using it. And instead of washing your driveway or patio with your hose, sweep the area instead.

Spread the WordYour conservation efforts will make a difference, but the best contribution we can make is to educate others in our community about this issue, and give them the tools to prevent it from worsening.

Facing the Facts

In Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis And What To Do About It, author Robert Glennon provides us with some startling facts about the depleting water supply in the United States.

Consider the following events that have occurred since 2007:

Colorado farmers watched their crops wither because of a lack of irrigation water

Atlanta, Georgia, came within three months of running out, so it banned watering lawns, washing cars, and filling swimming pools

Orme, Tennessee, did run out and was forced to truck water in from Alabama

Scientists at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography predicted that Lake Mead, which supplies water to Los Angeles and Phoenix, could dry up by 2021

Hundreds of workers lost their jobs at Bowater, a South Carolina paper company, because low river flows prevented the plant from discharging its wastewater

Lack of adequate water prompted the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to rebuff Southern Nuclear Operating Company’s request to build two new reactors in Georgia

Water shortages caused California farmers to cut the tops off hundreds of healthy, mature avocado trees in a desperate attempt to keep them alive